Confirmation Saint
by Cotto
Summary: This is a Buffy/Dawn friendship in College story, involving bullying by a classmate in season 10 volume 1 (New Rules) time of BtVS, included in it are my views on who would be her Confirmation Saint and why she would have chosen St. Joan of Arc as her patroness. It is also a Buffy/Joan devotion fiction. No slash, just friendship. Please do Enjoy!


**Confirmation Saint.**

_**By James Carmody.**_

_**Pennames: Cotto, Vantiri, Krulos, Thrawn, Palpatine, Vorchan, Adalack.**_

**Characters: **Buffy Summers, Joan of Arc, Dawn Summers, OCs

**Nature:** Friendship/devotion fanfiction.

**Disclaimer:** Buffy belongs to Joss Whedon, as do all her associate characters, Joan of Arc is a historical girl/woman.

**Author's Notes:** Joan of Arc is chosen for this story as Buffy's Confirmation Saint, due to a perceived devotion to her from the episode Tabula Rasa, and due to Elizabeth (Buffy) Summers' investigation of Convent life in the episode Triangle. Because the author is not familiar with any non-Catholic Christian religions that have Convents or Monasteries, he sees good input as to the heroine's religious beliefs- but it seems that she isn't likely to pay much attention thereto. Story is set in Buffy season 10, I believe, and, is something of a companion piece to Intervention and Annexation, with Buffy and Dawn as classmates in College, despite being 5 years apart (Elizabeth is, I think in her late 20s).

Elizabeth (goes by Buffy) Anne Summers was seated on her bed, reading a philosophy book out of curiosity one afternoon, as her mind got stocked with ideas, it wandered to the topic she had to specialize in since her first year in Sunnydale High: Community Defense, _'One reason, the __**main**__ reason I picked Joan of Arc as my Confirmation Saint a few years ago.'_ the heroine thought.

Buffy Summers had had a devotion to St. Joan for quite a time, since, in fact, she learned of the preternatural monsters that lurked in the night, and her seeming (and disturbing) role to hunt them- she really needed a sort of patroness- a guide of sorts. And, she felt, that girl would do nicely. As her thoughts grew dreamy, she placed the book on her nightstand, and fell asleep.

The next morning, the elder Summers daughter was awakened by her alarm clock going off like there was no tomorrow at about 7:00am. After dressing and preparing her breakfast, she spied Dawn heading into the room with her books "Hey, Buffy." Dawn said with a bounce in her step "ready for class?" _'How does she have so much alertness?'_ Buffy asked herself, completely perplexed about her sister's boundless energy. _'I'm barely awake yet.'_

Buffy had her brown leather jacket on, fully fastened collar to waist, and tight, beneath it, her yellow shirt, and very pale grey pants, with black leather boots. Her blonde hair was tight around her head. Her sister, Dawn was wearing a sky blue blouse, very pale blue pants, sneakers or boots (Buffy couldn't tell which), leather belt, her backpack was on both shoulders and that was carrying her books, her brown hair was in what looked like a bun-straight-inside style (the sections near her temples were set into a bun at the base of her skull, and the rest of the hair over the back of her head was falling down over her back- through the loop that the bun covered) _'Impressive hair style, Dawn.'_ Buffy thought amazed as both young ladies got into the car for Community College.

Buffy had finally made it, she finally thought she had enough stability in her life to attend to her education, and for once, she was feeling pretty darn good about her life!

When the ladies arrived in the College Campus it turned out that the sisters were classmates in many of the same courses! The ladies were **very** surprised about that!

Buffy had been out of the education loop for some time, in fact, she was about 32 at this time, and Dawn was about 27. As the sisters walked up to the College doors, side by side as friends, a group of other students started snickering behind the blonde, both male and female. Oh, they were subtle about it, but it was abundantly clear to anyone listening that they were about to pick on the elder of the two- Really Immature behavior! The brunette grabbed her sister by her right arm and whispered "just keep walking, Buffy, and pay them no heed." "Hey, Poofy!" one of the group blurted out, a female who looked to be in her late 20s about 28. She had deliberately gotten Buffy's name wrong to offend the Vampire Slayer… neither of the new students knew it, but Elisa Minilo was a very well disguised Vampire, and since this event was in about 2014, with the messed up 'food chain' in this time, Buffy's 'slayer sense' was Royally out of whack!

"Yoo-Hoo! Poofy! I'm trying to get your attention!" Elisa said again, to snickers by her 'gang'… Buffy ground her teeth and clenched her fists in anger. Being called 'poofy' was the worst nickname she had yet received; it implied that she was overweight and it was a deliberate mispronunciation of her name: "Buffy". Dawn glared at the bullies, but said nothing.

Some hours later, at lunch time, Buffy hung her head, frustrated, she just couldn't wrap her head around the topics of her studies, in particular: Latin, she had brought her textbooks to the cafeteria table, and Dawn was sitting next to her, rubbing her back and trying to help her with her studies. She would point to this word and that one, and try to get Buffy to see that the words refer to the same basic concept. "I'm just not getting it, Dawn, my brain's rusty!" Buffy said, frustrated.

"Rusty-Brain. Rusty-Brain." Elisa and her pack chanted, they were trying to get into a fight with Buffy, but it was Dawn who was going berserk towards them. "Do You Mind?!" Dawn finally blurted out, irritated beyond measure. "Hey, we like it here." Elisa said with a smirk. "Right! That's IT!" Dawn finally lost it completely; she stood up, Buffy knew the look on Dawn's face- her sister was about to look for a fight! "I'm going to need you to stop bullying Buffy…" Dawn said, after walking right into Elisa's face, almost, and she tried to stare the other female down, looking Elisa right in the eyes, from about half a foot away, her intent was to intimidate her into letting Buffy study- she had had it! Elisa put her right hand on her hip, and smiled sweetly at Dawn, and responded "That's right, sweetie? What are you going to do about it, huh?" in a mocking lilt. "Dawn, don't! You're going to get yourself in trouble…" Buffy tried to talk Dawn down, but the brunette was completely berserk now, and looking for a fight. "Oh, honey, we don't want to fight you…" Elisa said, in mock friendliness "We just want to fight your sister."

"Right! That Cinches It!" Dawn snarled, now completely overwhelmed with rage _"How __**dare**__ you pick on her?!"_ Dawn practically shouted in Elisa's face. Elisa responded coolly, "Dawnie, sweetie, it is a free country…" and blew Buffy a kiss, then started walking away. Dawn was completely beside herself with rage- all darn day these bullies had been picking on Buffy, now it had to end! She immediately punched Elisa full in the face. The force of the hit sent the vampress flat out on her back. Dawn issued a open challenge then and there "Anybody else want to bully Buffy?! If you do, you've got to come through me first!"

Sure enough, Dawn had to talk to the Dean of Student Affairs over this incident, just as Buffy had informed her would happen after the fight, and had tried to talk her down the whole time. Meeting with the Dean, Buffy, Elisa, her pack, Dawn learned the news "No more of that, or all those involved will be arrested!" the Dean said firmly. "I understand." Dawn said, but she was partially satisfied about having stood up for her sibling- she also understood that fights are not sound- fist-fights that is.

Later on in the day, Buffy took a little picture of St Joan of Arc out of her shirt pocket, held it to her chest, and re-inserted it back into her pocket, as a little devotion… she was happy to be in school again, and wouldn't willingly blow it for any reason!

"We'll be waiting for you, Poofy!" Elisa said at the end of the school day, now it was the elder Miss Summers who was beside herself with rage _'Would they EVER leave me alone to study in peace?'_ Buffy demanded of her patroness; she still didn't know that these were the monsters she was trained to fight- to her they were just bullies!

**Later on at the Summers home:**

As Elizabeth's eyelids grew heavy from her first day of classes in over five years, back in college, she was envious of her kid sister, but still loved her deeply, and was proud of her. _"St. Joan, why does Dawn get such classes so quickly? Don't get me wrong, I am delighted for her, she's doing fine, but I sure would like myself to be able to contend with her in this; I don't know, I just feel envy towards my little sis. Some help would be appreciated."_

Shortly thereafter, Elizabeth 'Buffy' Anne Summers zonked off to a deep, peaceful, exhausted sleep.

**Author's Notes:** The reason Buffy cannot detect the fact that Elisa is a vamp is that it's about at the time of Season 10, early… and was partially inspired by the cover of Season 10 Volume 1 "New Rules", the one with the classroom setting.

I also liked having Dawn get into a fight with the bullies in defense of Buffy.

The thing about Buffy getting envious of Dawn but still loving her is realistic to the crosses of the elder child in a family, and so I put it in here.


End file.
